Jared Kushner & Ivanka Trump Threaten To Sue The Lincoln Project
Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump threatened to sue The Lincoln Project over its Times Square billboards, which take aim at the administration’s response to the coronavirus pandemic, Raw Story reported.
The political action committee, which is comprised of Republicans against the president, posted an image of the legal threat from the couple, made via a letter to the organization, to Twitter on Friday evening.
“I am writing concerning the false, malicious and defamatory ads that the Lincoln Project is displaying on billboards in Times Square,” attorney Marc Kasowitz wrote in the letter.
“Those ads show Ms. Trump smiling and gesturing toward a death count of Americans and New Yorkers, and attribute to Mr. Kushner the statement that ‘[New Yorkers] are going to suffer and that’s their problem’ (alteration in original), with body bags underneath.”
The letter claimed that Kushner never made such a remark, and denied that Ivanka made the gesture portrayed in the ad. According to the attorney, the representation of the pair in the advertisements is an “outrageous and shameful libel.” Kasowitz ended the statement by claiming that a lawsuit will be filed against The Lincoln Project if the billboards are not removed immediately and predicted that the punitive and compensatory damages would be “enormous.”
Vanity Fair reported on the Kushner quote in question, which was purportedly a reference to New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s alleged failure to try hard enough to get personal protective equipment from the federal government.
“His people are going to suffer and that’s their problem,” Kushner reportedly said.
The Lincoln Project released a statement on Twitter addressing the threat not long after their initial tweet on the issue. The political action committee slammed Kushner and Trump’s “indignant outrage” as “comical” and claimed that their “empty threats” would not be taken seriously. The political action committee claimed that the advertisement “exposed” the pair’s “indifference” to the coronavirus pandemic and suggested that the threat of a lawsuit is an attempt to infringe on the group’s first amendment rights.
The declaration then slammed Trump and Kushner as “entitled, out-of-touch bullies” who have never shown themselves to care for the well-being of American citizens.
“The billboards will stay up,” the group said in its conclusion.
According to The Lincoln Project, the advertisements are “important” because they remind people in Times Square — which they called “the crossroads of the world” — of the “cruelty” and absence of empathy that the Trump and Kushner families have shown to the American people.
As The Inquisitr reported, The Lincoln Project has received scrutiny about its motives amid reports that 89 percent of its disbursements were funneled into operating expenditures despite spending relatively little on advertisements.
